Friday, April 1, 2011

Ekos of the Week - Con Lead (of course)

Your Ekos poll of the week is as fun as it is unsurprising. The topline numbers are Con - 36.9%, Lib - 26.2%, NDP - 17.2%, Green - 8.7%, and Bloc - 8.5%, or 36% in Quebec itself (similar to Nanos.. Bloc on a downtrend?).

There's no real surprises in this poll to speak of. The Conservatives have a good lead in Ontario with 41.6% compared to the Liberal Party's 32.2%, while the NDP lags behind with just 15.5%. The federalist parties continue to duke it out in Quebec, with the Liberals ahead sitting on 19.1%, the Cons next at 18.9%, and the NDP with 14.7%. In the West, the Liberals are second in 2 out of 3 regions, only being edged out by the NDP in Alberta, 17.6% to 17.1% (the Cons sit at 57.2%).

If you apply a basic swing to this, you would get 143 Conservatives, 86 Liberals, 43 Bloquistes, and 34 NDP, plus a couple of independents to mix it up. The reason why the Liberals perform relatively well is because of low Bloc numbers in Quebec, where they grab a few seats thanks to some close races (Brome-Missiquoi, Haute-Gaspesie, etc.).

What's really troubling in all of this is the continued lack of momentum for the Liberals in Ontario. Sitting between 32-33% is not healthy, given that its lower than what we managed in 2008. If we are going to form a government, we must have higher numbers in Central Canada. Getting better results in Western Canada is great, don't get me wrong, but its not where we'll be racking up seat counts.

The NDP have a similar problem; they're performing well in Quebec, very well in fact, but their western base is starting to fall in these polls. Even in BC they're falling below 20% in most polls, while the Liberals manage to come out as the best opposition. Not a good sign, and something they need to seriously rectify. They can't trade pointless votes in Quebec for useful votes in the West if they want to remain viable.

McGuinty has always dragged us down, but I think he'd be dragging anyone down that was affiliated with him - including the Conservatives, who are more than happy to cozy up to McGuinty. I think the problem resides elsewhere than just McGuinty.